Robert Hawker on the Spirit
– A Prelude

Many, in the generations following 1827, who have been born into families among the 'brethren' and have come to know the Lord Jesus personally as Saviour and Lord –

It may be well to state here that recently a book came into the hands of the writer, the perusal of which at once aroused interest, not only on account of the profound character of the subject matter but also

• because of an almost identical setting forth of truth as to the Holy Spirit, in statements strikingly and remarkably analogous to what has been happily and attractively engaging the brethren in a special and universal way during the past few years.

The book referred to was published in Plymouth in the year 1817. It contained six lectures or discourses, which were delivered by one, Dr. Robert Hawker, in Charles Church, Ebrington Street, Plymouth. The lectures are entitled, ‘The Person, Godhead and Ministry of the Holy Ghost’.

• Dr. Hawker ministered at Charles Church for 40 years, from 1787 to 1827, the year of his death.

A careful perusal of the following pages will reveal that the ministry is signally marked by an elevation of thought, a profundity of utterance and a depth of spiritual feeling that will arrest at once the mind and evoke deep thanksgiving,

• not only for the knowledge that our God used His servant to present and preserve the truth 130-140 years ago

• but that in our own day He has been pleased to revive and call the special attention of His people to this great and cardinal subject of the Person and office of the Holy Spirit.

Sober reflection of these facts will give one to see how our God sovereignly and graciously watered His inheritance then, and continues in His faithful love to distil the dew of heaven upon it now.

The writer has been encouraged to compile the ‘extraction’ of ministry contained in the following pages because to his mind there exists a peculiarly outstanding link or connection between this ministry of 140 years ago by Dr. Hawker and

As a child Robert manifested pleasure in quoting Scripture, and as he attained age he showed strong bias for a clerical career.

• His mother, however, wished him to follow his father’s profession and he was ultimately trained to this end. He went to a London hospital and eventually became a practicing surgeon.

God, however, had other fields of labour for him and sovereignly moved the young doctor’s mind and heart toward Himself so profoundly that,

• although now married and even against his beloved mother’s desire, he resigned his medical work and went to Oxford University at the age of 25 to enable him to enter the ministry.

• He possessed gifts of great magnitude and in less than a year he was given a curacy in Cornwall at St. Martins near Loos. He held this curacy for the brief space of three months, being moved to Charles Church, Plymouth in December 1778.

• He began immediately to preach with power and distinction the unsearchable riches of Christ. He would preach in language chaste, elevated and impressive.

In the year 1784 the vicar of Charles Church died and the young curate, who was a man of great integrity and superior talents, was appointed to the living and he began a ministry of outstanding spiritual power and influence which was to continue for over 40 years, only ending by his death in 1827.

• In 1790 he preached a series of remarkable sermons on ‘The Divinity of Christ’, and again in 1794 on ‘The Divinity and operations of the Holy Ghost’.

In the following years he regularly visited London and exercised such power in his ministry as an ambassador for Christ that the churches where he preached were unable to accommodate the numbers who gathered to hear him.

• An outstanding feature of his preaching was his insistence on the Personality and Godhead of the Holy Ghost and the glory of the Person of Jesus as in the Godhead.

• His church at Plymouth was invariably filled to overflowing, and he continued his powerful and spiritual ministry here, until his relatively sudden death in April 1827.

On Lord’s Day, March 25th, he was stricken with inflammation of the lungs and was unable to preach.

• He said to his daughter, ‘My dear child, I cannot go today to the house of the Lord, but this cometh of the Lord of Hosts who is wonderful in counsel and excellent in working; wisdom and power are His’.

During his illness and decline in bodily strength, he was strong in the Lord and rejoicing in the prospect of a glorious immortality. To those in attendance he seemed to enjoy holy and uninterrupted communion with God and the Spirit.

• After what appeared to be a refreshing sleep he said to his daughter, ‘My soul is overfilled with joy, I am filled with glory’.

• He constantly repeated portions of Ephesians 1, and among his last words were, “In whom we have redemption, through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace, yes, to the praise of His glory”.

Those surrounding the bed of the dying saint witnessed a holy serenity in his countenance which spake the inward aboundings of joy and peace through his faith in Christ Jesus.

• He showed no bodily distress or signs of death and in the presence of his family – he had eight children – he literally fell asleep in Jesus. His physician who was present said he had never witnessed such a death before.

So much was this man of God beloved and revered that the shops of Plymouth were half-closed until the day of his burial.

• His mortal remains were consigned to the tomb on the 13th April 1827, many thousands being present to witness to his love to God and to man.

• He died as he had lived, ever in communion with his God and in the enjoyment of a holy intimacy with heaven. He was an habitation of God through the Spirit. The power of grace rested upon him.

Here I would remind you of the ‘infinitude’ of the Godhead.

• There is a glory in God in the absolute, which may be called His essential glory, arising from His very Being and Nature, which is perfectly incommunicable to, and altogether incomprehensible by any creature.

• This is that glory in which He dwells in the unity of the divine Essence and Trinity of His Persons, in which the Holy Three in One – Father, Son and Holy Ghost –
  • possess alike and in common, all divine perfections, and in the mutual enjoyment of each Other have existed from all eternity in one unceasing and never to be ended state of holiness, blessedness, majesty and glory.

• With this essential glory, no creature ever hath or ever can have communion. Angels and men are alike precluded all approach, for so saith the scripture. See 1 Timothy 1: 17; 6: 16; John 1: 18.

But there is a glory in which we can have part and communion – His manifestative glory.

• This glory, through God’s infinite and revealed love, our spiritual faculties are capable of apprehending; it is the blessed manifestation of God in the Person of His dear Son.

• God the Father hath made known His everlasting love to His Church in acts of grace in Christ, revealed by the Holy Ghost, which define His Person and endear Him to all His children;

• Christ the Son hath no less displayed His everlasting love in betrothing the Church to Himself before the world’s foundation, and purchasing her in ‘time’, when those who now constitute her were fallen in the ‘Adam’ transgression.

• And God the Holy Ghost doth make known His personal and gracious love to every member of Christ’s body, when in the fullness of time He regenerates their nature and quickens them in Christ.

“My soul, feast upon these blessed realities times without number; sing the love song of Solomon to his spouse – of Jesus to His Church. Let there be daily visits of His love, let His waterings be known every moment. Let a tide from this ocean of love, divine and supreme, ever break in upon me”.

I desire to prosecute the glorious subject of the Holy Ghost. Think of His place in the operations of God in ‘Incarnation’.

• “Great is the mystery of godliness, God was manifest in flesh”.

• Who could have conceived a thought so wonderful that in the forming of the fabric of the human nature of Christ, this stupendous and miraculous edifice should be accomplished by the personal operation of God the Holy Ghost?
  • “The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee; that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God”.

• Our glorious Head is indeed “the Stone cut out without hands”.

Let me here refer to His precious death. In the high and blessed transaction of the death of Christ, this great sacrifice was offered through the Eternal Spirit – wonderful contemplation.

• When we pass on to the triumphs of the Resurrection, in proof of the Holy Ghost’s agency in this glorious deed, Christ was declared to be Son of God with power according to the Spirit of Holiness by the resurrection from the dead.

• Nay, this blessed truth is carried further, for scripture declares that
  • “The Spirit of Him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwells in you and He that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by His Spirit that dwelleth in you”.

• All this shall be effected by the blessed Spirit.

Here, beloved brethren, I take occasion to observe the manner of expression made use of in the scripture respecting the Holy Spirit.

• In Isaiah 11: 2 He is called in the original, “Ruach Jehovah”, i.e. “Spirit Jehovah”.

• Is that not beautiful confirmation of that seen in the New Testament in 2 Corinthians 3: 17-18, “The Lord Spirit”?

• The love of the Holy Ghost is of equal date and of equal greatness with that of the Father and the Son.

There was peculiar beauty in the order of the divine economy respecting this dispensation. The coming of the Holy Ghost was the great promise of the New Testament, as the incoming of Christ had been the great promise of the Old.

• At Pentecost the Lord the Spirit entered upon His ministry in the Church, making the members of the body of Christ His temple.
  • “The Spirit bears witness with our spirits that we are the children of God”.

• His divine superintendence and government of the Church henceforward are the highest confirmation of His Person, Godhead and Ministry.

• It was the Holy Ghost who said,
  • “Separate me Barnabas and Saul for the work whereunto I have called them”.

  • “So they being sent forth by the Holy Ghost departed unto Seleucia”, Acts 13: 2-4.

Unceasingly the Holy Ghost has watched and watches over the Church of God.

• It should be held in everlasting remembrance, the blessed consequences of His gracious work and ministry. Not a word of Scripture would be ours but for Him.

• The very precious records we have of the conversations between the Persons of the Godhead would never have been known but for Him – blessed Person indeed!

Is it not true, beloved brethren, that the blessed Spirit is not honoured in this our time with the same glory and love and praise as are the Persons of the Father and the Son?

• I would charge this upon my own forgetful heart, as I earnestly desire it may be impressed upon yours.

• Remember, the whole history of the life, ministry, miracles, death, resurrection, ascension and triumphs of Christ were all written, since Jesus returned to heaven, by God the Holy Ghost.

I proceed now to the great fact of the unction of the Holy Ghost personally upon every individual member of Christ’s body.

• It is blessed to trace our own personal history in the united love of the Holy Three Persons in the Godhead.

• We can know absolutely nothing of Their acts of love towards us until by regeneration. This vast and cardinal work must be wrought in us.

• Regeneration or new birth is the gracious alone act of the Holy Ghost; the almightiness of this act is apart from merit, or descent, or work on our part whatsoever;
  • until this sovereign act is effected there is no capability of knowing God or loving God, for the carnal mind is enmity against God.

• Further, regeneration or new birth is a sovereign work of grace which passeth only on our spiritual nature and makes no alteration on the human fabric of our body.
  • “That which is born of the Spirit is spirit”, John 3: 6.

• At the first resurrection it is our vile bodies that are changed.

From the moment of new birth the gracious design of the Lord Spirit is that the whole Church of God shall suck and be satisfied with the breasts of consolation, and milk out and be delighted with the abundance of glory

• What a glorious Person – the Spirit of truth, the Comforter, a Spirit of grace and supplication, a Spirit of Promise, a Spirit of Holiness, the Seal, the Sealer, the Earnest of the inheritance, the Eternal Spirit indeed.

One more blessed act of the Holy Ghost should be kept in remembrance. This great, this gracious, this Almighty Spirit doth not only indwell God’s people from new birth to the grave,

• but He becomes the efficient cause and power of raising, in the power of Christ, each for glory.
  • “He that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit which dwelleth in you”, Romans 8: 11.

Yes, He – blessed Person – abideth with His people forever. Let the Church consider what equal love, reverence, praise, and godly fear must be His due in common with the Father and the Son as the united source of all blessedness in time and to all eternity.

Beloved brethren, hear me I beseech you.

• May the Church of God be saved from the lukewarm Laodicean state.

• The glorious truths of our precious faith, the eternal truths of God must be preached – God’s electing, distinguishing everlasting love, the finished work and salvation of our Lord Jesus Christ, the essential work of God the Spirit in regeneration, the blessed truth of His Person and ministry.

• Our God is a jealous God, jealous of His glory and honour. These holy things must be preached.

“Great God the Spirit, Thou Almighty Minister of the Church of the Lord Jesus, take hold of us in Thy sovereign hand that ‘Ichabod’ may not be written upon us”.

There is a peculiar blessedness in the sovereign office and work of the Holy Ghost. He who anointed the Church’s head has anointed the Church’s members.

• “No one can say Jesus is Lord but by the Holy Ghost”.

All the ordinances, types, figures, shadows and offerings of Israel’s history were by the immediate appointment and direction of God the Holy Ghost;

• none but the Persons of the Godhead had knowledge of the events, sufferings and death which were to distinguish Christ the Son of God,

• none but the Holy Ghost could represent, under Jewish ordinances, the types and shadows of which Christ was the substance.

• The Ministry of the Holy Ghost was eminently striking in relation to the five signs of glory which were in the first temple and not in the second.

It must have been infinitely sublime and glorious the five great and holy signs of the first temple. These were

1. the Urim and the Thummin,

2. the Ark of the Covenant,

3. the fire upon the Altar,

4. the unction of the high priest,

5. and lastly, the spirit of prophecy.

• Jesus, precious Jesus, answered to them all.

• He was and is, the true Urim and Thummin, the real Ark of the Covenant; He is not only the fire of the Altar but both the propitiatory and the propitiation.

• His precious blood cleanseth from all sin.

I now wish to address you and expound with the Spirit’s leading, a setting of the holy truth which I will speak of as ‘Mystery’.

• There are mysteries attaching to the Godhead which to apprehend them in their fully glory is impossible. What is in its nature infinite cannot come within the range of what is finite.
  • If the nature and mode of existence of God was within the apprehension of His creatures, His incomprehensibility would cease and He would cease to be God.

• But while the essence and infinite glory of God are, and must from their very nature, be forever veiled in mystery, there is a glory – we have previously called it His manifestative glory –
  • which, in infinite condescension, God has been pleased to make known by special acts of grace from each of the Persons in the Godhead, to the Church in Christ.

• We are made acquainted with the personal love of the Father, Son and Holy Ghost in such a way and manner that there is opened up an everlasting source of adoration, love and praise to the One glorious God in and through the Person and mediation of our Lord Jesus Christ.

• It is not to be supposed that even the manifestative glories of our God are free from mystery.

• Many are the exercises produced by the mysteries of faith; these call forth the patience of the saints. Soon our abilities will be ripened in glory; we shall be taken out of the twilight of time and brought into the open day of perfect being and vision.
  • “We shall know as we are known”.

In the sacred prosecution of my subject I now come to the holy testimony of Christ to the Person, Godhead and Ministry of the Holy Ghost.

• In John’s gospel, chapter 16 verse 13, we have the blessed promise of Christ concerning the Spirit’s office and teaching thus expressed –
  • “When He, the Spirit of truth, is come, He will guide you into all the truth”.

• The words in the original language – the Greek – are ‘ekeinos to pneuma’. Now ‘ekeinos’ is masculine gender and ‘pneuma’ neuter gender. This combination is not admissible in grammar and impossible to explain; nevertheless
  • Christ purposely so expressed it to manifest and emphasise the personality of the Holy Ghost so that His disciples and the Church should know Him as a Person and reverence Him as such.

• The many offices of the Holy Spirit – comforter, teacher, witness, remembrancer, glorifier of Jesus, all prove that He is a Person.
  • Who but God, as God can glorify the Lord Jesus, and this is the Spirit’s office.

Shame on those who, in daring infidelity, would deny His personality and say He, the blessed Spirit of God, is only an influence, an energy, a quality, an emanation. Did not our precious Jesus say,

• “He shall abide with you for ever”?

• If the Holy Ghost is only an emanation, how could Jesus call Him “Another” Comforter? The very term “Another” implies One like Himself. An emanation could not take the personal place of Jesus.

• Only heresy would rob the Spirit, yes blessed Spirit, of His glories; may we never relinquish the glorious truth of His Person.

Awful are the times in which we live when men in profane boldness would so reduce the blessed Person of the Lord the Spirit;

• some alas, have even contended that there is an inferiority in the Persons to each Other. Some have attempted to propound inequality in the Three divine Persons.

• In answer, it can be triumphantly said from the authoritative word, the invulnerable word of Holy Scripture, that there is no superiority or inferiority in things relating to the Godhead.

• Each glorious Person in the covenant and economy of grace hath taken that Office for the manifestation of His personal love and grace and favour, as infinite wisdom and love in the divine ‘Council’ were pleased to appoint.

• True it is that the terms ‘second’ and ‘third’ Persons in the Godhead, and even the word ‘trinity’ are not scriptural; but are they not used as best calculated to explain what we mean when speaking on subjects of so exalted a nature and so necessarily involved in mystery?

• While the one grand fundamental doctrine of the perfect equality in the essence and nature of the Godhead, of all the Persons constituting it, be ever kept in view, the terms ‘first’, ‘second’ and ‘third’ used for distinguishing the Persons in the economy of grace, can never carry the smallest idea of anything inferior in the One to the Other.

• Every child of God in the true knowledge of the Holy Three Persons – Father, Son and Holy Ghost – can ever ascribe equal love, praise, worship and thanksgiving to each of the Persons as One in Godhead, and the source of all blessing.

And now another word on this profound subject.

• What a proof there is of the Person of the Holy Ghost in the solemn scripture of Mark chapter 3, verses 28, 29. The Son of God here distinguishes the Holy Ghost as distinct in personality from the Father and the Son.

• There is a sin capable of being committed against Him, said to be unpardonable. If the Holy Spirit were not a Person, Christ would not have declared the solemnity of this sin.

• To blaspheme against the Holy Ghost is a sin which could not be blasphemy unless it were committed against God, therefore the Spirit is God.

• Thus doth the Lord Jesus identify and blessedly confirm both His Person and His Godhead.

“Almighty Spirit of Truth, graciously confirm Thine own Eternal Power and Godhead to the hearts of all God’s beloved people; give unceasing revelations of the Father and the Son to Their everlasting glory, Amen”.

Dear brethren, I wish now to speak briefly of the great name ‘Jehovah’.

• Jehovah is an hemantic noun formed from ‘Hayah’ – “he was”; by prefixing ‘Yod’ it denotes a proper noun and the word becomes expressive of the ‘eternity’ of Jehovah.

• It can also be considered as a compound, ‘Jah’ to intimate the essence of the Godhead, and the participle ‘Hovah’, the eternity of His existence.

• In either sense the meaning is one and the same, the name Jehovah denotes underived being, self-existence, independence, immutability, everlasting being.

• This glorious and incommunicable name of ‘Jehovah’ is ascribed throughout the scriptures to all the Three Persons of the Godhead. How great then, how glorious is the Person of the Holy Ghost!

To expand the subject a little further.

• There is another name descriptive of the Godhead, viz. ‘Alehim’.

• This is the more striking because the word ‘Jehovah’ is singular – it has no plural, being expressive of the unity of the divine Essence.

• When joined, as in numberless parts of scripture with the word ‘Alehim’ which is plural, nothing can be more confirmatory and demonstrable of the great truth before us, that Jehovah Alehim hath His Being in a Trinity of Persons.

• It means the “Lord God’, and the translators of our bible have rightly rendered it thus.

It is to be noted that the name ‘Jah’ is mentioned once only in the authorized Bible, viz. Psalm 68: 4, and is a unique reference to the Godhead.

• The name ‘Ehjah’ is mentioned once only, Exodus chapter 3: 14.

• These glorious names profoundly demonstrate that Jehovah, though but One in the inseparable and undivided Essence of the Godhead, is nevertheless at the same time existing in a Trinity of Persons.

The New Testament in the Greek tongue describes the name ‘Jehovah’ in terms equally sublime, viz.

• “which is, which was, and which is to come, the Almighty”, Revelation 1: 8.

• As equally applied to the Person of the Father, of the Son and of the Holy Ghost, nothing can more convincingly prove that a community of Nature, Essence and Being must subsist between the Three Holy Persons, and that Each equally and jointly partakes in all the sovereignty and glory of the Godhead.

Another wonderful proof of this glorious truth is that the Attributes which distinguish Godhead are possessed by each of the Three Persons.

• The Omnipresence of God, the Omniscience of God, are distinguishing perfections of each glorious Person; in like manner are holiness, wisdom, and sovereignty.
  • Oh! dear brethren, the unspeakable felicity in knowing, feeling and enjoying God the Father in His everlasting love, God the Son in His redeeming grace, and God the Holy Ghost in His most blessed communion and fellowship.

• The personal knowledge of and communion with these divine Persons constitute the utmost blessedness of all God’s people and must form the purest source to all present and spiritual joy.

Dear brethren, I desire at this point to speak of an attribute of our God which is blessedly seen in each divine Person; I refer to ‘grace’.

• God hath made Himself known in the glorious attribute of grace; yea, He hath prepared and appointed an whole eternity for the display of it, for it is written –
  • “that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness towards us through Christ Jesus”, Ephesians 2: 7.

Grace is not confined to our being freed from sin and all the tremendous consequences of sin induced by the ‘Adam’ transgression.

• Grace comes from and riseth to an infinitely high source; its blessed manifestation in Christ is for God’s glory – Ephesians 1: 6 – and it will continue in its blissful operations when all worlds are done away.

• Was it not the greatest instance of grace when One of the divine and sacred Persons of the Godhead, Himself took the form of a servant and was made in the likeness of men – He became incarnate – and secured eternal redemption for us?

• Oh, remember that all the Persons in the Godhead were alike concerned in this marvellous transaction; each took equal part in the great covenant of grace; the act of one of the glorious Persons is the act of the whole, for the Godhead is One in substance and cannot be divided.

• Does not this supreme manifestation of ‘grace’ profoundly demonstrate the Person and Godhead of the Holy Ghost?

The word ‘grace’ is used in two significations.

• In one sense it is taken to convey the abstract quality of free favour or gratuitous bounty;

• in the other to imply the positive possession of that divine principle within the soul.

• In the first instance it is what it is in itself, in the second it is its operations and effect, or what it is to us. Grace in both these respects is the cause and means of all true blessedness to man.

• Christ was full of grace, grace came by Him, He was full of the Spirit; He had an infinite capacity which cannot be said of any creature.
  • The Spirit Himself must therefore be immeasurable and infinite to fill that capacity. He must therefore be God for these are divine qualities which can be applied to none but God.

• This must strike every believing mind with full conviction of the proper divinity of the Holy Ghost and silence the blasphemy of those who would venture to deny it.

• Yes, the Holy Ghost is called, “Spirit of grace”, because He is the fountain by which this grace doth wholly flow.

• He – blessed Person – is the conductor of grace to the souls of God’s so great a people.

Let us consider one further testimony to His divine Nature.

• ‘Sanctification’ is an act of grace and power upon the soul. It cannot be performed or maintained by the agency of any creature. It is throughout scripture ascribed to God.

• This divine operation is ascribed to the Father in the epistle of Jude, verse 1; it is ascribed to the Son, the Lord Christ, in Hebrews 2: 11; finally, it is ascribed to the Holy Ghost in Romans 15: 16.

• Is not this, dear brethren, signal evidence of the equality and coexistence of the Three Persons in the Godhead?

• They must have one common inter-community in the divine Nature. There must be homogeneity of essence or existence in the Three Persons, for a division of substance would be a division of mind, will and operation, and a gross ‘Tritheism’ contrary to the scriptures which declare irrevocably,
  • “Jehovah, our God, in One Jehovah”, Deuteronomy 6: 4.

• The doctrine of Three co-equal Persons to whom severally and distinctly are referred agencies and operations imputable to none but Deity is stated by a beautiful harmony throughout the scriptures, thus proving God’s unity of Essence and Trinity of Persons.

• Let me refer you to the scripture in 1 Corinthians 6: 11.
  • “Ye are sanctified, in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God”.

• In this choice word, sanctification is ascribed to the blessed Spirit of God. If therefore the Holy Ghost does sanctify the godly, it proves incontestably that He is God and the object of praise and adoration. He is conjointly with the Father and the Son true and very God.

• Oh! what blessings doth the unction of the Spirit confer upon us
  • He is to our souls a gracious Spirit;

  • He hath distilled like the dew upon our previously barren hearts

  • He has imbued us with His divine anointing;

  • He fills our spiritual capacities with His divine inhabitation;

  • He is the spring of all our bliss

  • He gives force and savour to the holy writings and directs our communion with God.

• He is the earnest of our inheritance; His gracious, constant work is delightful and full of uncloying sweetness.

Dear brethren, if this is our holy experience now in bodies corruptible, what then shall be the full measure of grace and glory when in our bodies incorruptible, there will be nothing to abate or distract for a single moment?

• This then is the wonderful and blessed work of the Holy Spirit. He is essentially God and we enjoy the effusions of His divinity.
  • He, blessed Person, enjoys every essential glory in perfect equality and concord, and bestows the grace of the eternal throne according to the eternal covenant and decree.

• Oh! what a transcendent and glorious place hath this divine Person in the operations of the Godhead in securing the salvation of man.

• Until the vast and mighty work of new birth is wrought in us sovereignly by the Holy Ghost, there is no capacity whatsoever of knowing or loving God.

Pause then and contemplate the almightiness of this sovereign act.

• Is not then the Holy Spirit, although the ‘third’ Person in the economy of grace, first in His service to us, for it is His divine office to quicken us into spiritual life;
  • not a phase of life can we enjoy, not an act of life can we perform toward God until the Spirit hath wrought in new birth and quickened us into spiritual life.

• Nay, not a promise can we plead, not a grace can we exercise, not a prayer can we offer, until He, blessed Spirit, hath first mightily and divinely imparted to us this wonderful spiritual life.
  • “That which is born of the Spirit is spirit”.

• Does it not fully and blessedly prove the Godhead of the Holy Ghost? Hath He not proved His personality and manifested divine acts of equal love to the objects of His favour in common with the Father and the Son?

Oh, believing Christian who art thus born of God and saved at a cost which angel cannot count, thou who wast a brittle clod, a crawling worm, a rebellious sinner, remember, yes remember thou art

• saved by the abasement and sufferings and death of the Son of God,

• saved by the power of the blessed and Almighty Spirit,

• saved by the eternal purpose and decree of God made know in Christ by the Holy Ghost.

• We who as atoms in a universe, once fit for the bosom of hell, now saved and made meet for participation in heavenly bliss and felicity eternal. It is love, divine love passing knowledge, love without end.

• Angels wonder, all heaven is filled with joy at the complacency of God and the happiness of man. Do not wonder that the inspired Psalmist is incited to celebrate the glories of Him who was to be blessedly known as ‘Saviour’.
  • “His glory is great in Thy salvation; honour and majesty hast Thou laid upon Him; for Thou hast made Him most blessed forever”, Psalm 21: 5-6.

• Should not the whole of the redeemed rapturously exclaim –
  • “Unto Him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in His own blood, and hath made us kings and priests unto God and His Father; to Him be glory and dominion forever and ever, Amen”?

Beloved brethren, it is because of the infinitude of the Godhead and the vast range of divine truth to be disclosed by declaration and revelation by divine Persons, the Holy Three, that

• One of these blessed Persons, the Holy Ghost, has become our Teacher and our gracious Guide. We thus adore and praise Him.

• The glorious greatness of the Christ of God can be described and communicated alone by Him, the Spirit, the Revealer.

• Who but the Spirit can set forth the glories of the Godhead to our apprehension, in a purity of whiteness which but for Him and His revealings would be too dazzling for mortals to behold?

• He alone can lead us to the continued celebrations of our precious Lord Jesus, the Christ of God, who is over all, God blessed forever, Amen.

Meditate again how great is our blessed adorable Jesus. Does not the Spouse say,

• “My beloved is unto me as a cluster of camphire in the vineyards of Engedi”?

• Is there not set forth in this beautiful similitude, the unnumbered excellencies of Jesus? In Him is found all the purity, harmlessness, perfection of humanity, the richest clusters of all spiritual graces, inherent holiness, divine promises and eternal blessings.
  • “In Him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily”.

• Marvellous contemplation; we are His by the conquests of His grace, the purchase of His blood, the work of His sacrificial unalterable love.

“Hail Thou great, Thou glorious, Thou everlasting Saviour and Redeemer; Thou are indeed the altar, the sacrifice, the offering, the High Priest, the Sacrificer. Thou art too our glorious Head; Thou wilt never case to be the immediate Head of Thy body, the Church”. “I would have my soul athirst for Thee, as the hart for the cooling streams. Blessed Jesus, Thy love is better than wine”.

Beloved brethren, we shall have everlasting enjoyment of Jesus in glory;

• He is the author of the Church’s unspeakable glory and felicity; He is to present her to Himself, a glorious Church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing.

• She is not only the purchase of His blood, but He has made her the temple of the Holy Ghost. If such be the holy dignity and distinguished beauty of the Church of Jesus, what must His glory be in whose comeliness alone she is made lovely?

• He who hath communicated loveliness to all His people, He is and must be the chiefest amongst ten thousand, the altogether lovely.

• Who can minister these divine, these eternal things to us and to the Church, but He who Himself is God, the blessed Spirit of God?

Oh, the eminency and transcendence of His holy service to us. What rapturous mediations belong to us through Him; what showers of love like plentiful rain fall upon our lives by His gracious indwelling.

• By Him, the Holy Spirit, we unceasingly behold new glories of Christ, ever receiving life-giving, fruit-imparting beams of richest light for the abiding sustainment of the verdure of our souls.

“Precious, bountiful Spirit of sanctifying grace. How great and blessed Thou art; what transports of rejoicings are ours by Thy ever sweet and constant communications of power and love”.

Yes, dear brethren, the choicest gold of Ophir becomes our storehouse by Him. Can any desire more than to be sealed with the Holy Ghost unto the day of redemption?

• Behold the tenderness of His gracious work, that He raises within my feeble heart a monument of everlasting praise and worship suited to the realms of eternity forever?
  • It is the grace and love of the Holy Ghost, with His teachings, quickenings, consolations, and strengthenings that cause me to mount up in heavenly mindedness and to become like the chariots of Amminadib.

• May these exalted things be our morning, noonday, evening and midnight mediation by and in His tender ministration.

“Blessed Sprit, Thou glorifier of my Lord, cause me to know Thee in Thy Person, work and power; Thou remembrancer of the Lord Jesus bring to my forgetful heart all the blessed things He hath revealed to me; continue to excite within me a seeking for Jesus, a seeking as for hidden treasure, fire my soul with foretastes of the loveliness of Jesus, the glorious greatness of God; ever keep me and all the redeemed in holy remembrance of these precious and eternal things. Amen”.

Beloved brethren, reverently review the several gracious offices of the Holy Ghost.

• He glorifies Christ,

• He leads to God,

• He sheds the love of God in the heart,

• He brings all things to our remembrance,

• He shews to us the things of Christ,

• He quickens the soul by His indwelling presence into responsive love and praise,

• He keeps open most blessed communion with God,

• Through Him and by Him my soul is perfectly satisfied with the adorable Person of Christ.

• What blessed variety there is in the offices of this divine Person, the Holy Ghost.

However different the acts of grace of the Holy Three Persons there is no difference in Their nature, power and Godhead;

• though distinguished in office, They are one in will, purpose and decree.
  • It is the personal glory of the Father that the Church is chosen by Him;

  • it is the personal glory of the Son that the Church is purchased by Him;

  • it is the personal glory of the Holy Ghost to make a revelation of the Father’s grace and the Son’s love to and in the heart of every member of the Church.

• It is on this account – the unique and gracious service of the blessed Spirit – that we do not find as many instances of prayer addressed to the Holy Ghost as to the Father and the Son. It is His office to indite prayers and to be in the people of God in prayer a Spirit of grace and supplication.

• All His blessed, unceasing service thus to us is in perfect conformity to the will of God and to the intercession of the Lord Jesus Christ. This proves the distinction of His Person and manifests His Godhead.
  • “No man can say Jesus is Lord but by the Holy Ghost”.

• All prayer and praise and thanksgiving are addressed equally to each and to all the Persons of the Godhead. The Church of God owes its place and blessing to the equal and joint acts of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.

It follows that each and all, distinct as to Person, One as to essence,

• be loved and praised and adored with equal thanksgiving by all the subjects and recipients of divine grace in the great and marvellous scheme of salvation,

• for all posses equally, all divine attributes and perfections in the exercise of Their sovereignty.
  • If the gracious act of choosing the Church of Christ before all worlds proves the Godhead of the Father,

  • and the purchase of the Church and the redemption of its members by Christ in time proves the Godhead of the Son,

  • so must the quickening into spiritual and eternal life of the members of the Church be equal and undeniable proof of the Godhead of the Holy Spirit.

Here in the realm of transcendent and divine and holy love there is no place for the unhumbled pride of human reason.

• Ever remember no possible increase can ever be made to the essential glory of Jehovah by calling into being any creature whether angels or men.
  • He hath ever possessed Being in Himself from all eternity; He hath ever existed in glory unspeakable.

• No addition can be made to God in the Trinity of Persons who have from everlasting lived in mutual enjoyment of Each Other, infinitely full and complete.

• Sooner might the noise of thunder be rendered louder by our poor feeble voice, or the great oceans receive increase from our tears, than addition be made to God.

• Jehovah is in Himself an ocean of blessedness and incapable of being more blessed. Even when we speak of His praise we cannot add to His glory.

The Holy Persons of the Godhead had glory and blessedness unspeakable in Themselves from all eternity.

• God, in calling into being His Church, destined for everlasting glory, hath displayed the mystery of His will.

• Of all the plans which, in the infinite stores of wisdom He posseseth, one gracious and supreme method reveals and demonstrates beyond all others the love and favour of each glorious Person of the Godhead;
  • the Church of Christ composed of the redeemed is to the praise of the glory of His grace, for He – the blessed God – hath made her members to be accepted in the Beloved – Ephesians 1: 6.

• Here are revealed the eternal transactions which took place in counsel and covenants between the Persons of the Godhead before time was; each glorious Person went forth in acts of divine love toward the Church in special and distinct manifestations as might define each Person in the Godhead.

• What a transaction was
  • the choice of the Church in Christ by the Father;

  • the espousal of the Church by the Son;

  • the anointing and sealing of the Church by the Holy Ghost;

• each holy transaction manifests the special love of each Person of the Godhead to the Church before worlds were.

Pause here, dear brethren, for a moment. The work of creation, the calling into being of this magnificent world was accomplished by the Holy Three Persons in the Godhead.

• At its completion the Sons of God shouted for joy. Alas, how soon the ruin of the whole by sin – the Adam transgression.

• Now were revealed the wondrous plan and scheme of redemption; even angels desired to look into this, and well they might, for what lay in the bosom of God from all eternity must be a subject worthy of the everlasting study of all God’s intelligent creatures.

• The display of this perfection of redemption is from the stores of God’s omnipotency; every divine attribute is involved – power, wisdom, mercy, grace.

• In the stupendous dispensation of the fall of man and his redemption by Christ, there is opened up a display of the riches of His glory by the most illustrious proofs calculated to make the soul cry out in an ecstasy of joy,
  • “Who is a God like unto Thee!”

• But while we wonder at the glories of redemption it should ever be remembered that redemption itself, in all its blissful consequences was ordained to magnify and exalt the Son of God supremely, as well as to bless and benefit man.

• Our blessing is immense and incalculably great, but the glory of Christ is infinitely greater.

• Oh! what unnumbered glories doth our Lord Jesus possess by this act of His!

Another word on this most wonderful theme.

• Redemption by Christ hath opened up in eminent degree the manifest work of the Holy Ghost.

• What unceasing agency hath the Spirit exercised in His Almighty Office on the subject of Christ’s work in redemption.
  • Did not Jesus blessedly say, “He shall glorify Me”,

• and since the Son of God returned to glory how abundantly hath the blessed Spirit wrought to this end;
  • from the day of Pentecost to this very hour, what acts of grace and power hath He shewn in regenerating, quickening, comforting, strengthening, teaching the souls of the redeemed.

• How sweetly hath He opened up and explained the sufferings of Christ and the glory which hath followed.

• Let the child of God pause over these blessed things. May the blessed Spirit give the inward illumination of His gracious holy service in His love.

What rapture of the soul ariseth from an heart-felt enjoyment of these precious things.

• Sweet portions of scripture linked together – like golden chains when linked together – give beauty and strength to the whole.

• The blessed ascriptions of praise in Paul’s great epistle to the Ephesians are as musical sounds in sweet concord, and bring harmony and melody which charm my soul.
  • Sing of the electing love of God in Christ – chapter 1: 4

  • – the adoption as children by Jesus Christ – verse 5

  • – our redemption by Christ through His blood – verse 7

  • – the gifts and graces of the Holy Ghost – verses 8, 9

  • – God’s mighty and future operations of purpose in Christ – verse 10

  • – the inheritance to which we are called and predestinated – verses 11, 12.

“I confess that as I walk by the way, or lie in bed, I chime one after another these harmonious portions of Holy Scripture, and find in them a blessed concord of sweeter sounds than can be found in pipe or organ”. “Lord Spirit, grant our souls to be excited in acts of praise and adoration and love to the glorious Persons of the Godhead whose sovereign grace has made sure our everlasting welfare; may it be our daily blessedness that we may be made wholly happy by an enlargedness of soul, that all may redound to the praise and eternal glory of our most wonderful God. Amen”.

And now, beloved brethren, in closing I leave the subject of  “The Person, Godhead and Ministry of the Holy Ghost” for your solemn contemplation under the grace of Christ wherein we stand.

• I entreat the Almighty Lord Spirit of whom I have presumed to speak, to graciously bear with all errors in this my feeble ministry of God’s word, and that by it He will make manifest the savour of His knowledge in every place.

• The doctrine of His Person is intimately related to the very vitals of salvation, and with this doctrine must stand or fall every thing momentous in the precious gospel.

• To deny the Person and Godhead of the Holy Ghost is to do despite to the Spirit of Grace. Is not the Church blessed and sealed in the joint names of the Holy Three? Our doxology is,
  • “the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God and the communion of the Holy Ghost”.

• If the Spirit did not, as One of the Holy Persons in the “Alehim”, possess all divine perfections, He could not be called “God the Spirit”.

The perfect equality of each divine Person in the possession and exercise of all divine perfections is the foundation and cardinal structure of all the vast superstructure of revelation.

• It is He and He alone who is the source of all spiritual enjoyment in taking of the things of Christ and showing them unto us

• All those glorious views we have of the Father and the Son in Their grace and love toward us, the Holy Spirit is the author of them. All is by the communion of the Holy Ghost, by His mysterious indwelling in our souls.

• The gracious service of the Spirit is most beautifully described by Jesus Himself in those profound chapters of John’s gospel, 14, 15 and 16. Read the Lord’s precious words and promises as to the Holy Spirit; what clusters of richest love tokens are there.

• Yes, dear brethren, it is under His gracious teaching that we get the very blessed insights into those things which are freely given to us of God.

• With what a world of tenderness hath God the Holy Ghost watched over the children of God in all ages. As Jesus could blessedly say,
  • “He abideth with His people forever”.

• Should we be silent in acts of adoration, love and praise to each glorious Person in the Godhead, must not the very stones of the earth cry out?

• How truly blessed it is to know and to bless each and the whole of the Holy Three Persons of the Godhead. To each and to all should be given unceasing thanksgiving and praise.

• Where there is a withholding of such praise, ought we not to blush at our unaccountable insensibility to the spiritual enjoyment of these most holy and wonderful disclosures of divine and perfect love?

• Surely our blessed God has raised for Himself in the riches of His grace, a revenue of praise in all ages from His inheritance, and shall we deny it Him?

• Is not the grand and predisposing motive of the divine benignity summed up in the precious words of scripture,
  • “The Lord’s portion is His people, the lot of His inheritance”?

“The Lord Spirit give His gracious blessing to all God’s beloved people, that in the clear apprehension and personal enjoyment of the several acts of grace from the Father, Son and Holy Ghost, the whole Church of God may know and live in the unceasing faith of the Trinity of Persons in the Unity of divine Essence, that our faith may not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God”. “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love Him; but God hath revealed them unto us by His Spirit; for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea the deep things of God”. Yes, beloved, we speak not in the words which man’s wisdom teacheth but which the Holy Ghost teacheth, for we have the mind of Christ. “The Lord the Spirit give His divine unction to the word delivered”.

For my part I have found blessedness inexpressible in going over this scared and precious subject. The contemplation of Christ is an eternal contemplation.

• By the Spirit’s gracious patient service, we advance in an holy familiarity with our most glorious Christ, and in joyous adoration of our God in His own inconceivable majesty.
  • “To God only wise, be glory through Jesus Christ forever. Amen”.

“Blessed Spirit and Almighty Teacher, whose divine acts in the covenant of grace are to glorify Christ give such an unction that our meditation of Him may be ever sweet; unveil His beauties, His glories, His mightiness, His all-sufficiency, and thus make every heart of the redeemed to be in love with Him, our adorable Lord Jesus. Grant to us, each and all, an ever increasing and richer apprehension of our most blessed union with Christ. Amen”. “Holy and Eternal Spirit, vouchsafe to make known to the souls of the elect Thine own divine Person and Godhead in the gracious ministry of Thine own divine power. For His name’s sake. Amen”.

I shall not offend I hope if I add – for I speak with unfeigned thankfulness and humility of soul – that what I here present to others, through grace, I have lived upon myself.

• The bread which I hold forth to them is the same bread which I eat. The weapons of warfare here taken from the divine armoury I have fully proved.

At the entrance on this very solemn subject of the Person, Godhead and Ministry of the Holy Ghost, there must be stated as a principle, that all the revelation Jehovah hath made of Himself must be from Himself and contained in the scripture of eternal truth.

• The Word of God is the only standard of decision concerning the knowledge of God.

• Premising these things at the threshold of our subject, it may be marked down, this great postulation founded in scripture, the certainty of the Being of Jehovah.
  • “He that cometh to God must believe that He is”, Hebrews 11 6.

Advancing further in the contemplation of this infinitely great and glorious God, connected with this faith of His Being, there must be connected with it the belief of the unity of His divine Nature.

• Both Testaments of scripture correspond in this great truth.
  • In the Old Testament we find the sublime statement of Isaiah 44: 6,

  • and in the New Testament the same language is found in 1 Timothy 6: 15-16.

• Thus in terms most magnificent do we find the Unity of the divine Essence asserted.

• Jehovah challenges His creatures as to this great and impregnable truth.
  • “Is there a God beside Me?”, Isaiah 44: 8.

• What beautifying fullness there is in the truth of the blessed Spirit! How great and majestic He is!

Some would dispense with His sovereign, regenerating, sanctifying work.

• The sin of despising the Person of the Holy Spirit and rejecting His work is equal to the idolatry of the Old Testament and to the Jew’s rejection of the Person of the Son.

• As to Him, the Eternal Spirit, let us take the attitude of holy invocation and adoration.

  ‘Thou art the Comforter, the gift
  of God most High, the Fire of Love,
  The everlasting spring of joy,
  And holy Unction from above’.

I wish to speak of the communion of the Holy Ghost. In His last communications to His disciples, what holy tenderness the Lord Jesus manifested on this subject of communion.

• He was on the eve of His departure to His Father; He was about to be received up in glory.

• In the light of this, He would assure His disciples – yea, all the redeemed to the end of time – of His constant abiding presence with them and the abiding presence of the Holy Ghost. How sweet His words to them,
  • “I will pray the Father and He shall give you another Comforter, that He may abide with you forever, even the Spirit of truth”, John 14: 16.

• Then as to Himself, He could say,
  • “I will not leave you orphans,” [comfortless] “I will come to you”, John 14: 18.

• Were there ever such expressions of equal tenderness as these of the Son of God? Cannot we look into His very heart in the blessedness of communion with Him by the Holy Ghost? Cannot our souls feast upon the precious promises?

• The precious section of scripture, John 14–16, is the doctrinal stronghold as to the Personality of the Holy Ghost.

• The tender words of Jesus radiate from this great passage a glory upon the whole system and circle of scripture truth as to the Spirit.

From Genesis 1 to Revelation 22 scripture sheds the warmth of divine life into every mention of the blessed Spirit.

• The Holy Spirit is the Author of the written Word. His Authorship is occupied not of Himself but the absorbing theme of the Son of God.

• He discloses enough of Himself to give full apprehension of His personal reality, but His theme, His burden is Jesus Christ. He deals with the blessed objectivity of the finished work and inexhaustible riches of Christ.

In the Paschal discourse, the blessed Person of the Paraclete is revealed as about to fill the void of the disciples’ hearts with a whole wealth of personal gracious action, abiding, revealing, leading, teaching.

• “The Spirit with our spirit”, Romans 8: 16,

• is a word intended to carry endless applications in the experiences of the life of Christian faith.

• The Spirit maketh intercession in us here below while Jesus maketh intercession for us above, both in exact unison and according to the will of God.

• What can sweetly encourage our fearful souls when going to the court of heaven and not knowing what to pray for as we ought, than the sure knowledge of this precious intercession by these Persons of the Godhead?
  • There is very great beauty in the word, “helping our infirmities”.

• The word in the original language means, ‘heaving with us’. Burdens too heavy for us are thus lifted and lightened by the blessed Spirit in His gracious, unceasing, divine service to us.

• Such communion should fill our souls with unspeakable joy; it is our precious portion, our inheritance.

There might arise with some the question as to whether acts of direct adoration to the Holy Spirit are prescribed to us in the scriptures.

• It is certainly remarkable that we have very little in their pages which bear explicitly on this question. Is this not however in harmony with the comparative reticence of the Author of the scriptures as to His own nature and glory?

• He does not present Himself for our articulate adoration, yet nevertheless the sacred rightfulness of our worship of the Holy Spirit is surely established on the many and immediate inferences from the scriptures.

• If He is divine if He is personal, how can we refrain from the act of adoration? Does He not preside in sacred majesty over all that is for God?

• So, dear brethren, while watchfully and reverently seeking to remember and maintain the laws of scriptural proportion, let us trustfully and thankfully worship Him and reverentially ask blessing of Him.

Let us ever remember the Holy Spirit is the Author and Inditer of the scriptures. He who garnished the heavens has garnered the truth.

• His language is superlative because the truth is superlative. No divine statement is over emphasised; none is understated. Verity and factual perfection characterises every divine utterance.

• The Spirit never uses – as men do – superfluous words. If He describes the promises of God as “great and precious”, it is because they are “great and precious”.

The subject of the Holy Ghost concerns our only true and eternal interest. It hath for its object all that is momentous in relation to the life that now is, and of that which is to come.

In prosecuting this great subject, I would emphasise that the operations of the Spirit are never separated from the Holy designs of the Father and the Son.

• The divine act of One of the Persons of the Godhead implies the will, purpose, decree and pleasure of All.

• To use a similitude, the actions of the glorious Persons of the Godhead are not unlike the beautiful colours of the rainbow. These are blended in one, yet distinct in each;
  • the weakest eye can plainly discover a diversity, while the strongest sight cannot discern where that diversity begins or where it ends.

• All form one glorious and magnificent arch which Jehovah hath set in the heavens as the token of His covenant faithfulness.

• Similarly, comparing great things with small, the acts of grace in the Holy Three Persons of the Godhead,
  • though distinct enough to mark distinction, yet all are but one and the same substance;

• three distinct Personalities constituting One in unity of divine essence.

• The receiving of this blessed truth ministers to the confirmation of the faith of every lover of God.

Beloved brethren, reverently contemplate the majestic operations of the Holy Ghost in connection with the Holy Person of Jesus.

• The miraculous conception and incarnation of Jesus with which the New Testament opens, incontestably confirms the Person, Godhead and Ministry of the Holy Ghost and make those great holy truths shine as with a sunbeam.

• What a profound announcement is that by the angels to Mary in Luke 1 :28-38. The Holy Ghost is expressly engaged in this wonderful act; what divine power and competence He possesses!

Then surely there never was a more positive and undeniable testimony than that displayed at the baptism of Jesus; what a glorious event it was;

• each divine Person – Father, Son and Holy Ghost – defined as to personality and Each engaged equally in this wonderful display on the banks of the Jordan at the threshold of the ministry of our blessed Lord Jesus, our glorious Head.

Yes, from this anointing of Jesus we can traverse the history of our adorable Lord through the whole of His wonderful life and we shall find in every act and office, the presence and abiding of the Holy Ghost.

• Let me say one word as to His precious death. Can we meditate upon it too often? Think of the majestic statement of the scripture in Hebrews 9: 14,
  • “Christ who through the Eternal Spirit offered Himself without spot to God”.

• Yes, each glorious Person of the Godhead had part in this stupendous transaction. All was by the will of God. What a blessed concurrence of the Holy Three Persons of the Godhead to this most blessed offering is revealed here.

• And is it not blessedly true of the whole life and service of our Lord Jesus Christ? Let every faithful follower of our Lord pause and contemplate the infinite display of design, mind, will and pleasure by Jehovah in the consecration of Christ to His Mediatorial Office by the Holy Spirit.

• How wonderful that He, the Christ of God, who is holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners and made higher than the heavens, should be anointed by the Holy Ghost.

• How great in Person and Ministry the latter must be! Who would deny His equality in the Godhead?

Ye children of God, who adore the sovereignty of God in His anointing of Jesus by the Holy Ghost, see and covet that ye too have the same Spirit, an Unction from the Holy One, that ye may know all things.

• While it is blessedly said of our glorious Head that the Father giveth not the Spirit by measure unto Him, it is also said that to every one of us – His members – is given according to the measure of the gift of Christ.

Dear brethren, does not the Holy Ghost still manifest His power and gracious Ministry because of Christ being now in heaven?

• Is there a tongue so profane, so blasphemous as to say this is not so? Let every soul redeemed by Christ declare.

• Do not the ascension gifts of Christ in the descension blessings of the Holy Spirit witness to the crowning and exaltation of Christ in heaven?

• Who but the Spirit of God comforts, nourishes, builds up the Members of Christ’s body on earth? Are not the sweet and gracious promises of Christ thus hourly and daily fulfilled?

• Did not He tell us of His expediency to go away, that He might send to us the Spirit? And having come, does He not form Christ in our hearts – Christ in us the hope of glory?

• Are not these precious holy things full, clear, palpable, undeniable testimonies to the Person, Godhead and Ministry of the Holy Ghost?

Let the Church of God ponder well the vast subject and sublime nature of the doctrine, deep and in mystery, of the personal unction of our Lord Jesus Christ by the Holy Ghost.

• I find it blessed to go over these holy things in communion daily; such communion fills my soul with unspeakable joy; it is my portion from the Lord, my inheritance.

• Oh! The surpassing greatness of Christ! He hath died for our sins, washed us in His blood, made us kings and priests to God and the Father, united His Church to Himself.

• It is personal holy love put upon us who are the objects of His favour; it provides an endless source of joy both in time and to all eternity.

• Yes, the blessed Spirit bears witness with our spirits that we are the children of God.

Can any child of God doubt the reality of the Person of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit?

• Would any dare to declare that the Holy Ghost is not a Person and exercises no divine ministry?

• Are not our souls led out day by day, refreshed, comforted, sustained, consoled and directed by Him? Such then is the communion of the Holy Spirit.

Dear brethren, one word more.

In this dispensation of grace, this wonderful economy of love, the Spirit’s day, is it not the supreme office of the Holy Ghost to glorify Christ?

• In the elevation of His Person, His blood, His sacrifice, His Manhood, His holy service to God and man, all yes all, is by the Spirit.

• All the anointings in the Old Testament, anointings of prophets, priests and kings, the vessels of the sanctuary and the whole ritual of the Tabernacle system and service, expressly referred to the unction of Christ’s Person by the Holy Ghost.
  • All the anointings under the law, and all the Offices – regal, priestly and prophetical – have alone reference to Christ.

From the antediluvian age we see the Ministry of the Holy Ghost among the patriarchs, their descendants and every faithful man.

• All were under the immediate power and influence of the Holy Ghost and wholly actuated by Him. Large and bountiful traces of His saving power and grace may be discovered upon their hearts.

• Did not David call Christ Lord – Psalm 110: 1? This prophetic utterance was by the Holy Ghost. Is it not by the same blessed Person that we call Jesus “Lord” – 1 Corinthians 12: 3?

What irrevocable confirmation we possess in that great scripture Hebrews 9, that all the ordinances, types, shadows, figures, pointed to Christ. He was the substance of them all.

• Does not this scripture say that He is Mediator of a new covenant that He has entered into heaven itself, to appear before the face of God for us?
  • In an age of infidelity like the present, these great divine facts must be spoken and repeated.

• The Holy Spirit’s superintendence of every spiritual ordinance and His signification of them, blessedly displays and confirms His Person and His Godhead.

Finally, dear brethren, I desire to say a simple yet worshipful word as to my adorable Lord who is the blessed subject and theme of the scriptures and the One who the Spirit of God delights to magnify and glorify. My word to you is this –

• The prerogative of our Christian faith, the secret of its strength is this that all which it has and all which it offers is laid up in a Person. This is what has made it strong while so much else has proved weak.

• It has not merely deliverance but a Deliverer, not redemption only but a Redeemer. This is what makes it sunlight, and all else when compared to it as moonlight.

• And oh! How great is the difference between submitting ourselves to a complex code of rules, and cleaving to a Person.

• Our blessedness – oh! that we might not miss it – is this, that our treasures are treasured in a Person who is not for one generation a present Teacher and a living Lord, and then for all succeeding generations a past and dead one,
  • but who is, blessed be His Name, a present Teacher and a living Lord for every and all generations for ever.

• What a wonderful contemplation for us is the greatness, the holy uniqueness of the Person of the Christ!

Dear brethren, I conceive the divinity of Jesus to be the chief corner stone in the edifice of Christianity.

• Remove this from the building and the whole fabric immediately totters. The foundation is shaken to the very centre.

• The great doctrine of atonement and expiation by the blood of Jesus falls to the ground, and all the rich promises of the gospel are done away.

May every lover of Christ continue with becoming confidence, to assert by the Holy Spirit’s power, the greatness, glory and dignity of the blessed Person who through grace we love and serve. Amen.

Robert Hawker
Departed to be with Christ, 1827